To Be The Instrument Of Evil To What You Wholly Love
by Nosferatu's Cigarette Binge
Summary: Rumpelstiltskin gifts Belle with an unusual necklace. Set post-curse, pre-'the Crocodile'. Non-smutty one-shot.


**A/N** First written while listening to Bjork's _Pagan poetry._ Finished a few days later while listening to David Bowie's _Hole in the ground_ and Franz Ferdinand b-sides. Please forgive the mistakes. I am yet again posting in haste. The title is from _Jane Eyre,_ page 109, volume the second.

Dedicated to my dearest friend, Lord Jonathan.

**Disclaimer:** I do not claim any rights to the characters in this story.

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Rumpelstiltskin bestowed unto Belle a silver chain, upon which hung a stone of impassable darkness. Framed in engraved silver and coloured in blues, purples, mossy greens, golds, and the deepest of blacks; as if labradorite. Within which it appeared Rumpelstiltskin had captured the night sky, for as Belle searched thick, murky depths for the core of stone she witnessed minute clouds part in the deep, inky cosmos, as if they were shadowed fish swimming through stagnant emerald waters.

"It will shield you from feeling great misery or woe."

She assumed the bauble was enchanted and immediately wished to return it, but to do so would only be cruel. She knew he didn't wish her any harm. And, though, she was loath to admit it, she loved the strange feeling the rock instilled in her; it was a rich, warm contentment quite like catching the scent of fire amidst a field of snow, or, when situated near a vast body of water, to feel the breeze ensnare strands of ones hair.  
He removed the pendant from her hands and stepped behind her to clasp it round her neck.

"Please keep it, my love. Do not deny me the pleasure of seeing you wear it," he whispered fervently, his lower lip brushing against the lobe of her ear.

She grasped the pendant with the tips of two fingers and quickly slipped it under her gown, letting it rest on her xiphoid bone. When she looked up, it was shyly into his eyes, forgetting that he watched her actions in detail. In embarrassment she realized his gaze still lingered on her fingers and chest beneath. His mouth was fitted into a tight line, in restraint; in longing. She tilted her head and reached out to him, wanting to brush her hand along his face. But just as quickly as the want seized her, she decided against acting on it; quickly withdrawing so that her hand would fall on the other resting on her chest. As Rumple watched the deft, flowing movement of her wrists, he bit his lip and gradually uncoiled his claws to wrap them around hers. All too aware of the fact that his touch was dangerously close to her bosom. He pressed her bony flesh to his mouth, and ran his lips over the padded underbelly of her nails before letting his teeth lightly grace the skin of her palm in a longing kiss.

Belle breathed in, not knowing what to do with the intensity that radiated from her being. Through it she worried he could detect her weakness. She fidgeted as she imagined her feelings were so strikingly evident they surrounded her in a cloud of energy. Her love, her want heated her, made her dizzy. Forced her to fall back to the most basic of instincts, almost completely void of words. Void of coherent thought other than whatever basic line best described what she felt at the moment. _I love you. _The words pried from the pit of her soul to escape her lips without permission. He looked up over her fingers into her eyes. Closing his mouth, he crept to stand within an inch of her. As he did so, she felt the stone around her neck more than double in weight and suddenly become very hot. It felt as though it was molding itself to her chest. As this commenced, her body flooded with a sudden ardency and contentment. It made her weak it was so intense.

"I give to you only some of what I feel," he said. "The stone is a fragment of my soul. It still lives within me, though solidified and constrained by my own means. It passes from one containment to another, and should remain with you if only that small amount is redeemable. You are the one person capable of purifying the rest. Unfortunately, with it you shall know the honesty in my confessions; along with a thin shadow of phantoms that have haunted me for more years than I dare recall. You'll how I've longed for you, how I have missed my son... But you will know not the details of my life, only the raw feelings. They will linger in you for this moment only, and for that I am truly sorry, my love. There simply wasn't any way that I could contain a piece of myself without including the negative aspects as well. But it will soon pass, leaving you to feel only my love afterwards. And so, henceforth, if you need me I shall be with you... always."

As he spoke, her body felt aflame with the longing, remorse, bitterness, sadness, and want.

"Know also that my recent use of magic has not been to purposely defy you."

Saying nothing, she looked to him, holding her hand over the beating stone wedged into her chest. She wanted to weep; unsettled by the immense sadness that he forever carried with him.

"You can take it off. You needn't feel obligated to wear it. If someone else happens upon it, it will be nothing more than an ordinary rock. Only you have the soul it requires to live. If you lose it, there won't be any repercussions," Rumple said, misunderstanding the sadness etched on her face.

"I have asked you to refrain from magic only because I don't want you to revert to you old ways, Rumple. You have suffered far too long. I ask that you let me be the one to rid you of anguish. Let me be what consumes you, not anger, not revenge. Let wounds heal and the ancient rest."

"Let me love you." She ran her hand over his, and the warmth sent currents through their bodies. Through their hearts.


End file.
